Chapter Twenty-One
Harlow
She was trying to process what she was seeing.
Vanek was there, and he was using fire to battle a creature that made no sound and attacked faster than any human she’d seen move. The two of them slammed into each other over and over again, though neither seemed to be getting the upper hand.
A dragon. That’s what he’d said he was. It wasn’t the first time she’d heard that, and now that he could wield a sword of pure fire, Harlow was forced to wonder about the accuracy of that statement. Still, where were the wings and the snout, the massive, scaled beast? That was a dragon as far as she was concerned. This was just impressive strength and magic. Real magic, not illusionist trickery. Even this far away she could feel the heat of his blade, and that was a tough thing to fake.
Then there was the strength with which he seemed to hit the creature, sending it flying through the air. It seemed unnatural to her, far too strong for a human.
Hope soared in her chest as Vanek went on the offensive, driving it backward with seeming ease. He was going to do it, he was going to win! Then abruptly the black monster stopped his attack cold, holding him still.
Uh-oh.
It lashed out at his chest and Vanek hurtled through the air, slamming into the side of one of her floats. The metal simply collapsed around him as he plowed deep into the center of it, damaging it far worse than the one they’d tried to repair. Anger at this snapped the world back into focus.
“ARE YOU KIDDING ME?” she screamed at him.
“I’m sorry!” he said, extricating himself from the wreckage by simply tossing the vehicle aside. “I’ll buy you a new one to replace it as well.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Of course.”
“And why would you do something like that?”
“Well, firstly, because I wrecked it.” Vanek’s sword came up to block a blow as the blackened creature attacked him again. This time he got the upper hand and ducked under its arm, his sword morphing to a weaving rope that wrapped around the center of the beast.
Vanek growled and hauled on the line, the effort flinging the creature across the floor, buying him some time. She gasped as he fell to one knee, his lungs heaving, and his face lined with the strain of the fight.
“And secondly,” he said while panting, “is because I love you, and you’re my mate.”
Saying the words seemed to empower him slightly and he rose to his feet, once again with sword in hand.
Harlow fell back, the mangled wreckage of her float completely forgotten. Emotions pummeled her brain as words she’d never expected to hear blasted through her strongest defenses, reaching her inner being and striking home. Her defensive shell was peeled back like the skin of an orange, leaving her vulnerable and shaken.
I love you.
The rest of his statement was lost, mere background static to her compared to the import of those eight letters, in three distinct words. It awoke a heretofore incomprehensible response within her that stunned Harlow with its intensity. Her hands trembled, legs weak-kneed and knobby, unwilling to support her weight. She sank back down to the ground.
It had been years since someone had said that to her. She’s mostly shunned anything serious, running away before it could reach that point. Now, in the darkened warehouse with both their lives on the line, Vanek had finally managed to push past her defenses—blow them apart, more realistically.
Wait a minute.
“You chose now to tell me this?” she yelped at the same time that his sword flared brightly, sparks exploding like fireworks as he blocked a flurry of blows from the creature.
“I tried to call you to explain,” he gasped, sounding exhausted. “But somebody refused to answer their phone!”
Harlow’s jaw snapped shut. Shit, he was right. That was frustrating.
Vanek growled, smashing the creature backward with a ferocious blow. Once more the sword morphed into the whip and he sent the matte-black monster bouncing across the floor into the side of the half-repaired float that they’d worked on together.
“You’re ruining my business!” she shouted at him as he closed, the whip hardening into the sword as he sliced apart the float in an attempt to kill the creature.
“I’ll buy you all new floats!” he roared, hammering down furious blows on his foe.
“Your timing is horrible, you know this, right?”
Vanek couldn’t reply as a long-bladed black arm-sword combination flashed up and blocked his blow. She watched in horror as it came at him with both its left and right arms, black-bladed swords weaving and attacking him from all sides. One connected to his ribs and he howled in pain, lashing out with a right fist that rocked the creature backward, buying him precious seconds, though it appeared to sap some of his energy upon contact.
Fear slithered its way into her open heart at the sight. Not concern for herself, no, but ice-cold terror that she might lose Vanek before she told him how she felt. The truth of how she felt. All at once Harlow realized why she’d been so crushed by his disappearance the night before.
It wasn’t because she’d been ditched, though that did hurt. No, it was something she’d refused to tell herself until now, a truth that she’d been running, even internally, unwilling to confront it. He couldn’t die. Not now. Not before she told him how she truly felt about him.
That his feelings were echoed in her.
“I’m trying over here,” he said, darting around one of her undamaged floats, putting it between him and the creature, buying him a moment of respite. “It wasn’t really my choice, you know.”
“You need to finish this thing off,” she said.
“I’m trying.”
The double sword-armed thing looked at the float, and then with a casual movement of its lower body kicked the entire mass of metal at Vanek. He yelped and dove out of the way. It bounced and rolled across the floor before tearing the wall off the warehouse as it exited the side wall. More light poured inside, though it was still obscured by the rain.
“Please don’t lose, Vanek,” she said as he got back to his feet. “I need you not to lose.”
“Why?” he asked, struggling to stand, still planting himself between her and the attacker.
This was her moment. She felt it. The time to reveal her feelings to him was upon her. All she had to do was open her mouth and speak up.
So why was her jaw locked tight?
Images of her father rose up, burying her under a lifetime worth of abandonment and fear of opening herself up to pain. Her muscles clenched tight, her brain fighting against her heart in a struggle for supremacy. She looked at Vanek, watching him wearily get to his feet once more.
He was doing this for her. Trying to fight this implacable monster, this juggernaut, not for himself, but to save her. No matter what happened, he needed to know that she cared. That she would be able to move past the anger she felt over the previous night. And if they were both to die there, he deserved to know that he wasn’t dying uncared for.
Without being…
She couldn’t even think the words anymore. It hurt too much. She couldn’t bear that pain.
Not again.
Vanek was knocked down, scrambling backward out of range of the attacker, and Harlow was forced to flee as they closed on her position.
Tell him!
But she couldn’t.